Conventional search engines generate revenue by charging for advertising and for popularity rankings in connection with key words. Also, search engines traditionally are programmed to rank websites based on their popularity and relevancy. In fact, empirical studies indicate various political, economic, and social biases in the information they provide not to mention what results happen to be most popular at the time and/or are most heavily advertised generally or through the search engine itself. In other words, these biases could be a direct result of economic and commercial processes (e.g., companies that advertise with a search engine can become also more popular in its organic results). Political influences biasing search results may also occur.
While the process and methodology to determine rank is specific to each search engine (the “best” results are relative to which criteria the search engine values and provides in its unique or proprietary algorithm), the overall search engine process is very similar from one search engine to the next. The usefulness of a search engine depends on the relevance of the result set it gives back. While there may be numerous pages that include a particular word or phrase, some pages may be more relevant, popular, or authoritative than others. Most search engines employ methods to rank the results to provide the “best” results first. How a search engine decides which pages are the best matches, and what order the results should be shown in, varies widely from one engine to another. In traditional Web searches, the methods also change over time as Internet usage changes and new techniques evolve and as new and unsolved problems evolve as is the case with consumer search requiring peer scrutiny opening up a niche for the current inventive system merging consumer search, social/reputational search and social commerce. An alternative approach is desired that allows search rankings to instead be based on, for example, the quality of products to be purchased as a result of the search. The present invention addressed this need in the art.